Wednesday, 14 January 2015

Before you start reading, grab a coffee or, possibly, something a little stronger...this is a lengthy stream of thought that I've tried to fashion into something that makes sense. Sometimes it may wander...

We’ve all heard, seen (and possibly written) the meme’s that
have heralded the death of cartography, the death of the printed map and so
forth but these slow-news-month scare stories couldn’t be further from the
truth. More maps are made by more people than ever before and if anyone is
worrying that print mapping is dead then Mapbox might just have precipitated
the second coming with their new printing
capabilities. The irony.

The number of books on maps published in the last year has also
rocketed and someone you know was likely spoilt for choice when choosing their 2014
Christmas gift for a map-nerd son or daughter. Plenty of delicious coffee-table
books full of great maps are currently available (see Jonathan
Crowe’s review to which I’d add the NACIS
Atlas of Design and James Cheshire and Oliver Uberti’s superb The Information Capital as two of
my recent favourites). 2015 looks set to bring more of everything to our
browsers, our desktops and our bookshelves. The appetite for maps has never
been greater and sure, we see a lot of cartographic crud that we have to wade
through but in some senses it makes the gems even more special when you find
them. Map-making and the interest in maps, then, is in rude health…but what of
cartography? We rarely see mention of ‘cartography’.

Cartography is defined as the discipline dealing with the
art, science and technology of making and using maps. The International Cartographic Association
(ICA) has recently been accepted as a full member of the International Council
for Science (ICSU) which is the international non-governmental organization
devoted to international cooperation in the advancement of science. Cartography
just graduated but I find that the term and what it stands for remain a term of
derision for many. My feeling is we need to re-establish cartography as modern
and relevant, because it is.

There’s no doubt cartography has undergone significant
change in the last decade and a number of people have claimed we’d be better
off if we just forgot about ‘cartography’ as a definition or as a framework to
talk about mapping. Change is nothing new in the mapping sciences because
evolution has always radically alter the mechanisms of map-making from time to
time. This is usually a technological change (engraving, lithography,
computers, cellphones, Google…) which has a massive impact on both the design
and production of maps and also the people involved in map-making. New people
enter the mapping landscape which both challenges and reinvigorates but it
usually goes hand-in-hand with cartographer’s moaning because it usually means
they have to retrain, reinvent or let go of ageing techniques. Feeling
threatened or at least a little frustrated by change is inevitable if your
skills and experience are overtaken so frequently by the new kids on the block.
It’s tiring to perpetually invest the energy to keep pace; and also to face the
challenge of people trying to constantly rename what it is you do.

Cartography is a word that many new to map-making seem reluctant
to use. Not so long ago, up stepped the self-proclaimed ‘neo-cartographers’
whose moniker describes the people and processes of making a map outside of the
community of professional map-makers. That’s everyone right? I’ve written about
my views of neo-cartography being a fallacy before
but don’t we already have a definition that’s relevant? It’s called ‘amateurism’;
and before you baulk and rip me to shreds I say that not in a derogatory sense
but merely as a perfectly good differentiator. An ‘amateur’ is a person
attached to a particular pursuit, study or science in a non-professional way.
Amateurs may have little professional training. Many are self-taught. The
negative connotations of amateurism mean that sub-par work is often easily
explained but that’s also broadly true as most of the time a non-professional
will not be able to produce work to the same standard as a professional. So why
do we constantly need new terms to describe making and using maps when the word
cartography, whether it’s as a professional or amateur pursuit, seems to fit?
It’s perfectly acceptable to have professional and amateur cartographers making
maps. Many of the best maps were made by amateur cartographers anyway.

New terminology tends to be sought to describe a movement that
wants to be seen as different from the past. New. Fresh. Exciting. Maybe being
unencumbered by the perceived shackles of formal training is what defines a
neo-spirit but they’re just bringing different skills and new insight to bear
to cartography which is no bad thing. The open source movement, Volunteered
Geographic Information and Citizen Science have been the backbone of the rise
of ‘neo’ because computer scientists and programmers need to have something to
programme and geographical data (and lots of it) has coordinates which lend
themselves very well to computer processing, particularly if there are other
numbers attached to these coordinates. Coders saw geo as a vast untapped
marketplace and jumped on the mapping bandwagon…partly because cartography and
professional cartographers were too slow to grasp the mettle. There’s a lot of positive
work that these ‘amateur cartographers’ (and professional computer scientists)
have brought to bear and I don’t disagree that formal definitions of
cartography don’t need challenging. But I do take issue with the creation of a new
species called neo-cartographer (or whatever) because it seems to go
hand-in-hand with decrying what’s gone before while at the same time
hyphenating the label to bring a sense of stature to their own efforts. They
are fledgling cartographers whether they like it or not, albeit not necessarily
in the sense of what has gone before. Rather than embrace cartography they
prefer to distance themselves and even become vocal in their anti-cartographic
sentiment because for some reason they know best. I got into a brief twitter
exchange recently because a ‘designer’ had stood up at a small conference
gathering and proclaimed they were a designer and that meant they need not talk
with a cartographer because they wouldn’t have anything to add that they couldn’t
already better. That arrogance and derision is quite common. My retort was
simple…everything is designed and cartographers design maps; so what’s the
domain specialism of a generic ‘designer’? Truth is, if the designer had
collaborated with a cartographer the map product would likely be far better than
sum of the parts anyway. Same goes for your average coder…in fact the same goes
for probably 99% of amateur cartographers.

This issue with the word cartography goes deeper. This is
about people’s perceptions and misconceptions of what cartography is and what a
cartographer does. Of course, the term cartography isn’t as old as map-making
anyway and so the claim that it’s the defining framework for mapping can be
plausibly challenged. The term cartography is modern, loaned into English from the
French ‘cartographie’ in the 1840s, based on Middle Latin carta "map".
While relatively new, it has nevertheless become synonymous with the definition
of the art and science of making and using maps. It helps to define a
discipline (and now an official science). Yet the public perception of
cartography is also awash with a lack of understanding of what a cartographer
does. To many, cartographers just make maps ‘pretty’. They are more concerned
with finessing the aesthetics of the map than the need to make the damn thing
and publish it. Maybe that perception bears fruit in some instances but it’s a
gross generalization and most professional cartographers I know take a healthy
approach to the graphical marriage of form and function.

And these misconceptions can get quite alarming. I recently
had a conversation at Border Control at Los Angeles International airport where
the Officer (wearing the obligatory hand-gun and devoid of humour) asked my
occupation. I often say something nebulous that will get me through unscathed
but increasingly I feel I should just say it as it is so I said ‘cartographer’
when asked my occupation (curiously, despite the fact I have never had the term
‘cartographer’ as part of any job title). Stunned silence ensued and the
Officer eventually asked ‘what part of the cars do you fix?’. My British sense
of humour wanted to say any number of things but the lack of humour and
obligatory hand gun made me pause and simply reply that I made maps. The
Officer retorted that she never knew that; so we had a brief conversation about
how her map gets on her cellphone and yes, that there are places that still
need mapping. After I’d been processed I wished her a pleasant day as I
wandered through and pondered on the fact that her impression is probably quite
common…and it’s really not that far removed from people’s knowledge and understanding
of cartography in the geo and mapping industries themselves. I’m serious. The
number of people I know who work in the geo industries who wouldn’t know a
decent map if it reared up and bit them on the arse is staggering. Sometimes
they make maps. Sometimes they market or herald maps made by others. Mostly
they just carry on in their own ignorant way satisfied that their own facts are
perfectly OK…and get annoyed if people point out deficiencies. I also recall
reading the jacket notes of a book on cartography, published in 2009, that
claimed they wrote it because no other books on cartography existed. That’s a
blatant lie. Just because you didn’t look very far doesn’t make it a fact. And
there’s the problem…people prefer their own facts rather than making the effort
to learn those that have already been proven or written. So these negative
connotations about cartography begin to blur into personal facts by people
predisposed to that argument and view of identity.

So if you’re a coder, journalist or designer (or anyone new
to making maps) and you make maps as part of your work…you’re involving
yourself in cartography, but you likely never call yourself a cartographer
because of those connotations and perceptions. If you’re going to play in the
same sand-pit as other cartographers I propose it would help rekindle respect
for the discipline, rather than perpetuate divisions, if you learnt a bit about
what being a cartographer is really all about. I don’t propose you take a class
because you’ve done that already to become an expert in your own field but
appreciate that some have taken classes in cartography and that makes them
experts in that field. We can’t all be experts in everything and with such
crossover between job requirements these days we inevitably need to tool
ourselves in ways that make us amateurs in some things while professional in
others.

The sweeping technological changes and turnover of people at
the forefront of cartography means change takes place almost as regularly as
fashion but like fashion, most new is actually old and reinvented for a new
audience who are simply arriving at their map-making using a different
approach. The rise of open this and that has brought this new set of people to
the light table who use spatial data as a way to flex their computing muscles
or to tell their data-led stories. Modern browsers, new programming languages,
SDKs, APIs, open geospatial data and the freedom of the internet created the
perfect storm and there were many storm chasers just waiting to jump into the
mapping milieu. I recently compared the internet to Mos Eisley spaceport from
Star Wars (Episode IV) and the famous Obi-Wan quote “Mos Eisley spaceport. You
will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy. We must be
cautious.” It’s true. The internet has brought wonders but also troubled times
for cartography because it has largely tried to denounce it (mostly with
terrible maps it must be said). The neos got their mapping hands dirty but also
made cartography a little grubby in their dismissal of much that had gone
before. The mindset of many of these amateurs has sullied cartography because
the quality of the result rarely matters even though there’s been some
beautifully disruptive gems amongst the general mess that’s been created. But here’s
the sting…the more these amateurs work with maps, the more their work matures
and the less they remain amateurs – they become part of the profession through
practice and experience. No one ever said you have to have qualifications to be
a professional. On-the-job experience counts for a lot if you’re willing to learn,
develop and develop knowledge and understanding to go along with your
experience.

Because change is inevitable (and why should we stop anyone
from having a go or getting involved in map-making anyway?), it’s beholden on
cartographers and those geospatial experts who know something about high
quality, meaningful mapping and data visualization to accept change because
it’s part of the territory. It’s not particularly unique to cartography either
so the idea that we get a raw deal is perhaps simply part of a stereotypical
view of reality. The fact is, change happens and it happens rapidly. Becoming
part of the change, being the change you want and working to ensure the
fundamental basis of cartography is retained is vitally important. If we leave
cartography to the amateurs we’re running the risk of leaving behind all the
good stuff for short-term gain, reinvented techniques and an approach that
tends to prefer butting heads with convention rather than embracing it and
making good use of it.

I’m simplifying and generalizing of course (it’s what
cartographers do) but the brain and skill drain is palpable in much of what we
see in cartography. Academic programmes are largely gone or where they do exist
they’re seen as too theoretical and not practical enough (by neos) or are too
far down the buttonology road to be considered ‘proper’ courses (by academic cartographers).
National Mapping Agencies have had to rapidly alter their course to take
advantage of new approaches. Maps are now personalized and mostly we default to
the ubiquitous offerings on our desktops or mobile devices…and we consume
transient maps about this whimsical topic or that fanciful theme daily. And
cartographers still moan. We’ve got to get with it as much as we want our new
map-making friends to get with it. Embrace change but work to promote what
cartography is, how it can be inclusive, not exclusive and what knowledge and
skills one might reasonably expect a cartographer to possess as they develop
from amateur to professional. That may render some people as perpetual amateurs
but that shouldn’t be negative. We are all amateurs at something or other
(sport, cooking, writing…).

In pondering how to encourage people to value cartography; to
encourage cartographers to stand up for their profession and expertise; and
show those new to map-making what cartography is about I was inspired by some
parallels in the debate on User Interface design (UI) and User Experience (UX).
Up until only a few years ago you’d never hear of a job title with either UI or
UX in it, let alone in combination with the ultra-trendy ‘designer’ or
‘architect’ monikers. These labels have even entered the mapping domain…map
designer, map architect etc (never cartographic designer or cartographic
architect you’ll note). As a tangent, it’s an improvement to ‘GIS cartographer’
or someone who can make ‘GIS maps’. What is that? I digress. It’s meaningless,
that’s what; and it demonstrates if you’re hiring that you don’t really know
what it is you want or need. So what of the label of cartographer? It’s a
perfectly good label but it carries baggage (to wit…the moaning guys hunched
over draughtsman’s tables with pens). Erik Flowers’ excellent look at the
differences between how User Experience wants to be seen and how it is seen (www.uxisnotui.com) has many parallels in
how cartography and cartographers are viewed and how they might wish to be
viewed. His thesis is, effectively, that UX is poorly understood, that people
don’t really understand what it means and, consequently, they have little idea
of the scope of work that a User Experience Designer might be capable of. He’s right.
And one could argue that this is the problem that faces cartographers and
cartography whether we’re talking about Border Control Officers or the latest
neo-map-hacker. Flowers produced this fantastic sheet that explains in very
simple terms how UX wants to be seen and how it is typically seen:

The point of Flowers’ list is to try and debunk what a User
Experience expert is, what their skillset and expertise is and what roles they
are able to fill. Some are entire jobs or careers and some are perhaps a little
more transient but what he wants you to realize is that UX designers are not
just people who do UI design or who think the world can be solved through UI
design. He wants you to appreciate that there is much more to being a UX expert
than many might immediately think.

So I made a similar list for cartography and the sort of
expertise and roles cartographers are involved in.

How cartography might be seen

Before you claim that not every professional cartographer
wants to be seen like this let me be clear…I agree. The list is of expertise
and skills that cartographers will possess in different combinations and to
different levels. Possibly not every cartographer can claim they are proficient
in every part of this list (actually, I’d be wary of any that do) but it shows
the breadth and depth of the cartographic profession.

And on the other hand, the following version of the same
list is generally the way in which cartographers tend to be viewed: as an
ill-defined, nebulous group of grumpy people who tend to just make maps and
complain about everyone else’s maps, note the perception of this has also seen
a subtle change from the word critique (constructive, supportive, rigorous and
justified) to Police (simply critical). And yeah…it’s in Comic Sans.

How cartography is generally seen

This is an unfortunate situation but I’d challenge anyone
within the cartographic community to refute that this is how many others look
at us and what we do. It’s no wonder people claim all we do is colour in with
computers (a phrase my old Dean of Faculty used in describing the geo, GIS and
cartography courses at Kingston University…he’s risen to Senior Deputy
Vice-Chancellor while GIS and geo have all but closed…terrible sign of the
times). But these sort of narrow-minded people never seem to really understand
or want to understand what it is that a cartographer brings to the table. In
fact, you’ll see this lack of understanding permeate across job adverts and
specifications and even within organisations that should know better. Whose
fault is this though? Well I began this by complaining that cartographers
simply complain and in many respects I feel that as a community we have largely
been the architects of this perception. Where once cartographers were Royal
appointments they are now backroom staff and, to be frank, you’re likely to
need to be a coder or something else first and foremost and an amateur
cartographer second. The ability to know how to make a map is tangential to
many other job requirements. It’s also the case that when you make a map many
employers wouldn’t know the difference between a good and poor map anyway.
Quality is low on the list of priorities for many. Speed and turnover is more
useful. And so the path to the dark side is complete as apprentice becomes the
master. A new order is formed that eschews the past and leads to the rise of an
alternative with a new mindset. Yes, I’m using a Star Wars analogy again which even
had those on the good side like Han Solo mocking the Jedi: “Hokey religions and
ancient weapons are no match for a good blaster at your side, kid.” Trouble is…actually,
most people side with the Jedi in Star Wars and ultimately appreciate it. Good
triumphs evil. Just like the Jedi, cartography gets bashed about a fair bit
from time to time but it needs to reinvigorate, return and prevail as the way
in which we set out the cartographic order in our universe.

We’re currently awash with neologisms because, frankly, if
you’re a new player in the mapping landscape you want to be seen as new, avant
garde. You want to make your mark and not be viewed as simply regurgitating the
cruddy old stuff you think cartographer’s of yesteryear hold so dear.
Neologisms such as GIS mapper, map-maker, map designer and…neo-cartographer. In
fact, you’ll have to hunt hard to find any ‘modern’ map-maker wanting to use
the simple term cartographer to describe what it is they do. These neologisms
have become personas. They take on new meaning as they attempt to shake off the
past and define a new set of skills and expertise. They also define a way to
divide the past from the present but that, to my mind is simply divisive for
the sake of it. Why does everything have to be seen as new? Why is there such a
determination for people to want to break from the past and to differentiate
themselves so markedly. There are clearly now improved ways of doing cartography
that replace older ways but it’s evolutionary, not revolutionary. Does the fact
I can’t code in Javascript or I prefer to make a map using a GUI rather than
code up CSS make me a bad cartographer? No. It just means I do my work a
different way. The International Cartographic Association’s definition of
cartography covers it I think. Let’s not reinvent what it is and let’s accept
amateurs as well as professionals and see them as bringing different things to
the table. Let’s also try and ensure the rest of the world understands
cartography and what it is to be a cartographer a little better. And that
starts with the geo-professions more broadly developing a better understanding
of the broad church of cartographic expertise and practice rather than
constantly trying to avoid it, ignore it or reinvent what it is they do.

My point is simple (despite the lengthy essay)…whether we
call it cartography or not (and we should call it cartography), cartographers
have much to offer. They are rarely seen as people that have such a varied
skillset as I’ve set out here but I would encourage us to shift our thinking.
Being a cartographer is a fine profession. What needs to happen is to explain
far better to people what we do. We need to go beyond simply saying ‘I make
maps’ because that reinforces the stereotypes. We need to avoid infighting
between those who prefer to print their maps and those who prefer to code. We
need to accept that some make maps using GIS software and some use Illustrator
and Photoshop. You know what…some people use a wide range of approaches and I
have Esri software, Adobe products, QGIS and Tilemill installed on my computer.
I use ArcGIS a lot (inevitably, I’m paid to…though in the past this has been by
choice also). I also have Mapbox and CartoDB accounts. It’s allowed.

Beyond the different ways in which we approach the craft, we
can start re-establishing cartography by encouraging people inside and out to
acknowledge the expertise a cartographer can offer and see them as vital in an
organizational context. ICA are making efforts to underpin this with the
designation (by the United Nations Committee of Experts on Global Geospatial
Information Management) of 2015-2016 as International Map Year which is
formally launched at the 27th International
Cartographic Conference in Rio de Janeiro in August. My good friend, current ICA President
Georg Gartner has also written in a similar vein recently on The
Relevance of Cartography and Challenges
to Cartography. As cartographic professionals, we all need to help develop
a better public image; one that encourages amateur cartographers to see
themselves as such (or as working towards becoming professional) and that
allows people more generally to understand how the map on their mobile phone
arrived there. It’s not magic. It’s cartography. It's a great word so let's embrace it.

Postscript: I'm no longer Editor of The Cartographic Journal after a 9 year stint but if I were...this would be the first Editorial of 2015.

Postscript 2: Well done if you got to the end. I hope it's provoked some thinking.

Maps are my passion and my profession. This is my personal cartonerd blog where I offer opinions and critique maps. Serious points with a good dose of British sarcasm. Do not be offended. It's about the maps, not you. Views entirely my own.